This invention relates to buildings.
There exists a need for a system of constructing buildings and building clusters which reduces the delay and high costs inherent in erecting a building on unprotected sites by completing the buildings as far as possible entirely inside a factory and transporting the entire building or major completed portions of such a building such as rooms or group of rooms to the eventual site, thereby reducing the time and effort involved on the site to the operations of placing the building or group of rooms or rooms on its or their foundations and making the connection of such services as water, drainage and electricity. Also, it is desirable to reduce the time and skill involved in erecting a building cluster from a large number of small components which are provided in an unfinished or semi-finished state, by making the greatest possible use of the limited number of completely finished components, each capable of manufacture at relatively high speed under controlled conditions in the factory, and all of which are capable of assembly under factory conditions with a minimum of skill.
Still further, it is desirable to reduce the difficulty and cost of altering and removing buildings, including in the changing of position and removal and insertion of doors, windows or walls, the addition or subtraction of rooms or wings of the building, and the shifting of all or any portion of the building from the site on which it was originally erected to any other site, by construction of a building in such a manner that whole or any part of it may be dismantled easily and either removed altogether or replaced with some other part which is compatible with the original.
It is also desirable that the building should be designed to modular design restraints in a manner such that replacement of structural elements is assisted by the modular design and assembly of buildings into a building cluster can also be facilitated by the use of modular design restraints.